


Four Times George Weasley Remembered Fred, and One Time He Didn't

by celebros



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Aurors, Gen, Grief/Mourning, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2015-04-28
Packaged: 2018-03-26 03:11:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3834829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celebros/pseuds/celebros





	Four Times George Weasley Remembered Fred, and One Time He Didn't

**-one-**

 

After the obituary is published in the newspaper, George goes back to the shop for the first time. For the past three days he has been tugging incessantly at the tiny scraps of cartilaged skin that remain on the hole in the side of his head; Percy pulls him aside and points it out to him, asks nervously if it mightn't make it worse. George wants to shake him, to scream doesn't he understand that _nothing_ can make it worse? But it's too late to be angry at each other.

 

Owls are already piling up outside the door. He's had enough condolences for a lifetime. He walks from shelf to shelf, and finally when the world here is too silent and too real he shoots an Impediment Jinx off, and another. The first slams into the wall, but the protection charms are still in place here. The second hits a shelf of Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder and Decoy Detonators, and he sinks to the ground; for the next two hours he sits in the black with little whirring mechanical creatures scuttling around over his feet.

 

He thought it would be Ginny who'd find him, but he's surprised to realize he isn't disappointed when it's Ron. Ron puts his hands under his arms and lifts him to his feet, pulling him out of the shop. He's grimacing, dusting off George's clothes with both hands, but he's silent, too. George was always closest with Ginny – it was Fred who'd always believed in Ron in the hardest times, and looking in his little brother's eyes, George concedes his twin's point.

 

**-two-**

 

April Fool's Day is going to be hell forever afterwards. It ceases being George's birthday; it is now the day on which they all gather and Mum cries and they try to pretend to be happy for the extra candle on the single cake. Harry is conspicuously absent the first few years, but when Gin is twenty they announce their engagement, and Harry never misses another family birthday again.

 

The first time he arrives unexpected in a puff of Floo powder, and Ginny and Ron are on him in an instant, murmuring over him, brushing at his clothes and whispering you-shouldn't-haves.

 

“Posh,” Harry says, and looks George straight in the eye with a grin. “Happy birthday, old man,” he says, and tosses him a small package. It's an Extendable Ear, modified like an eyepatch to wind to his head, and enchanted to keep the nub in his stubbled hole, allowing the ear-bit to float off like its forerunners and pick up conversation. George is astounded that no one ever thought of this before.

 

“Been meaning to make you one of those forever,” he says, and no one wants to tell him that this is their Sad Occasion, so they celebrate, and Mum has to smack his Ear away from her more than once as she whispers about cake or gifts to Charlie and Dad. A smile quirks on her lips.

 

When the Burrow has wound down and Ginny's wandered off to bed (although not 'til after she and Harry disappear for a quick snog), George is sitting in a wooden chair off to the side and smiling faintly. Harry reappears, looks around to make sure that none of the family are paying too much attention (they're cooing over Bill's latest pictures of Dominique), and snags George's tie, pulling him onto the lawn.

 

“Hey,” George says, “you know how I feel about you, mate, but I think Gin might object -”

 

“It was Fred's idea,” Harry says, and that shuts him up. “He'd just started working on it, after your birthday. I found it when Ron and I went back to clean up the shop, and I've been working on it ever since. It's been finished nearly a year, but I was afraid to give it to you. Because it's not mine. That was Fred's present to you, George.”

 

He presses a small flat package into George's hands, kisses his cheek with a rough gentleness George has never known since then, and vanishes into the house. A moment later he hears voices lift slightly, and then the fire roars. Ron is the one to find him, again. He has taken the Ear off and is holding it in his hands. George can see from Ron's face that he knows.

 

He lets Ron open Harry's gift, which turns out to be a Mauraders-styled Map of Diagon Alley. Ron stares at it himself for a good long moment to pass it on. George doesn't know that ever since third year, his little brother always looks for the dead on these maps.

 

**-three-**

 

It wasn't what they'd talked about, but when the certificate asks the baby's name, George and Angelina say, “Fred,” in unison, because he was their best friend. In the first week the baby comes home, he thinks Ange might regret it, because he sits with the baby in his arms constantly, equal parts melancholy and joy. But soon the little one is nicknamed Freddie, a horror never bestowed on his brother, and he comes back to life.

 

**-four-**

 

Umbridge is released from prison the year Freddie turns four, and one afternoon not long after, George and Freddie appear in Ginny's living room. She's eight months pregnant with Lily by then, and sitting in an armchair working on articles.

 

“George, what's wrong?” she says, starting up, and then, “Blast,” as she realizes she needs a hand. He shakes his head once, says, “I'll explain later; can you watch him an hour or so? Ange's at work,” and Gin says, “Of course; Al and Jamie are sleeping, no trouble,” and he says tightly, “Thanks,” and Disapparates.

 

Three hours later, an exhausted Angelina turns up with apologies and flashing eyes. “Jamie enjoyed having someone his age, I think,” Ginny said easily, “and Harry's not home from work yet so we had extra dinner in any case -”

 

“They're crusading again, those husbands of ours,” she answers darkly, and gathers a sleepy Freddie in his arms.

 

Harry explains, near midnight, that Umbridge had made the mistake of trying to enter the Wheeze's shop in disguise. Even so long after the War, many of the shops along the alley still had old Auror protections up, and George and Ron had maintained their means of determining whether their buyers had ill intentions. Umbridge, scarcely three weeks out of prison, had. George hadn't been at the shop at the time, but he'd been called. He and the Aurors had spent the night tracking her down, and then called Hermione for some legal reinforcement. The woman would be back in prison by morning.

 

“And?” Ginny asks, sensing it.

 

“And the Aurors have forbidden me to use non-members on searches,” Harry answers wearily. “It's a long time in brewing; I've been using Ron for years now. Reckon he'll start training soon, then, if he's banned from missions otherwise. Kingsley's pissed. George hexed her something awful.” He holds up his hand; despite her urgings, he's steadily refused to get any treatments to remove the scar there. “I wasn't the only one Umbridge got to, it seems.”

 

“I've never seen a mark on George's -”

 

Harry shakes his head, once, and the jagged edges on that movement say it all.

 

**-and one-**

 

George puts it off and puts it off, but he finally comes for Quidditch. Freddie's made Keeper his third year, and he owls begging for Mum and Dad to come to his first match in an unprecedented show of affection. Ange promises to come for the meet itself, but why don't you go early, George? And as much as everyone expected it, no one finds him lurking in the rebuilt corridors, trying to find the exact spot. No one finds him lingering in the Great Hall where he'd held his brother's body.

 

Neville's got his eyes out, and Freddie's old enough to know himself that there's a reason his dad never came when he'd broken his knee last year trying to crawl in a second-story window. George has spent a solid twenty years avoiding Hogwarts, but now that he's here there's nothing to see. He sneaks in through the one-eyed witch, scares the daylights out of Jamie Potter down the Charms corridor, slinks a peek over indignant Victoire's shoulder at the Ravenclaw table as she pens a letter to Teddy, darts past Hagrid's hut to the Forbidden Forest. It's Filch's last year – Mrs. Norris has passed on – and all of Gryffindor Tower knows who persuaded McGonagall to change the password to “Mischief Managed”.

 

He sits next to Ange the next day and bellows his lungs out. Scorpius catches the Snitch, but between Jamie's Chasing and Freddie's Keeping, that leaves Slytherin with one hundred and fifty points, and Gryffindor with two hundred ten. Little Albus (who on top of being too young is terrified of broomsticks) sits next to him, and screams like a banshee when he realizes it's over, and George cannot stop laughing.


End file.
